Chapter Text
Sir Radzig Kobyla walks through Margrave Jobst’s camp beneath the bright summer sun. The makeshift city of tents hums with the restless energy of men preparing for war. Around him, soldiers shout commands and clash wooden swords in training drills, while others lounge by campfires, laughing or sharpening blades to pass the dull hours of waiting.
The efforts to rally an army against Sigismund’s forces are progressing well, Jobst’s envoys having returned with promises of men and arms, but the task still feels monumental. Sigismund’s shadow stretches long across Bohemia, and Radzig knows every day counts.
He’s halfway down the row of tents when a sudden commotion rises near the edge of the camp. Urgent shouts echo from the sentries, the sound of hurried footsteps, a horse’s distressed whinny.
Radzig turns sharply toward the noise.
A pair of riders emerges from the dust. Both are slumped over the same horse, barely upright, swaying with each faltering step of the exhausted beast.
Radzig quickens his pace. The horse halts, a few soldiers rushing forward to help. As the first of the riders is eased down, Radzig recognizes the face beneath the grime and blood. Martin’s son, Samuel, his face ashen, his eyes closed. He is carried away at once, but Radzig’s gaze is already fixed on the second figure barely hanging on behind.
The young man still on the horse is pale as death beneath a crust of dried blood, his hair matted, his eyes unfocused.
“Henry…”
For a heartbeat, Radzig can’t move, but instinct quickly takes over. He rushes forward just as his boy slips from the saddle, catching Henry with a soldier’s help. The weight of him is heavy, boneless, as they lower him carefully to the ground. Radzig sinks to his knees, cradling his son against his chest.
The sight steals the breath from his lungs. Henry seems starved and worn down, his face hollow, his cheeks sunken, his lips cracked. Blood stains his torn tunic, dark and dried in some places, still wet in others.
“Henry!” Radzig’s voice trembles as he grips his son’s shoulders.
The boy stirs faintly, his eyelids fluttering open just enough to reveal the faintest glint of blue beneath. His breath rattles as he tries to speak. “Message… for Jobst.”
Radzig’s heart pounds in his chest. The soldier beside him fumbles with Henry’s torn shirt, searching for the wound. When the fabric parts, dread floods through Radzig.
A deep, jagged gash runs across Henry’s abdomen, dark with dirt and dried blood. It oozes sluggishly now, the bleeding nearly spent, not from healing but from the body’s strength running out. It’s a wonder the boy has made it this far.
Henry draws in another shallow breath, the effort making his whole body tremble. “Send help…” he rasps, each word a struggle. “Suchdol… Hans…”
The rest of the sentence dies in his throat. His body goes still, the faint tension in his limbs vanishes, leaving him limp in his father’s arms, eyes still half-open.
Radzig’s heart stutters. He tightens his hold, shaking his son gently, but Henry doesn’t stir.
“Wake up, Hal!” he calls, the name breaking into raw desperation as he shakes him harder. Henry’s head only lolls against his arm.
His skin is already cold beneath Radzig’s palm as he presses a trembling hand to his cheek. He leans closer, feeling for the faintest breath, but there is nothing.
“Son…” The word catches in his throat, small and broken. “No.”
The soldier beside him lowers his head. “I’m sorry, my lord.”
Radzig doesn’t hear him. He pulls Henry close, clutching his son’s body in an embrace he never gave him in life.
He had sent Henry out into the world to serve, to find his place, to fight in a war that was never meant to claim his life. And now, that decision has taken everything from him.
The camp fades into silence as Radzig kneels in the mud, head bowed over Henry’s still form, mourning not only his son but the cost of his own command.
He has sent his only child to his death.
The courtyard of Suchdol is quiet now. The clash of steel has faded, replaced by the groans of the wounded and the low murmurs of the living. The battle is over, the siege broken, the Praguers finally driven out by Jobst’s men.
Hans kneels amid the wreckage of the courtyard, one knee pressed down, his breath coming hard. His arms feel like lead, his stomach hollow after days of siege, his head light from hunger and exhaustion. The long siege has stripped him bare.
He draws a slow breath and looks up.
At the gate stands Sir Radzig Kobyla. His armour is soaked with mud and blood, his face drawn. In his hand, he carries a sword Hans would recognize anywhere.
Henry’s sword.
For a fleeting moment, he feels relief. So Henry has succeeded, he has found his father and returned his sword.
Then Radzig’s eyes meet his.
Whatever faint hope Hans had dies with that look. There’s no need for words. The man’s expression tells him everything. Radzig’s usually stoic face is a ruin of grief, too raw to be hidden. His eyes are red-rimmed, his expression hollow, the weight of loss too deep to hide.
It isn’t the sorrow of a commander mourning his fallen men. It’s the unfathomable agony of a father who’s lost his son.
Hans feels something die inside him.
Henry had promised he’d come back. He’d held his hand when he said it, stubborn and sure, like he always was. “Everything will be all right,” he had told him.
He bows his head, staring at the blood on his hands. The victory seems futile now.
A hand grips Hans’s arm. Godwin hauls him up, steadying him when his knees threaten to give way. Hans barely notices the ache in his body anymore.
Through the gate comes his uncle Hanush, flanked by two soldiers. His voice carries across the courtyard, too loud for the silence that hangs there.
“Well,” he calls out, surveying the wrecked courtyard, “Did I come at a bad time?”
“Quite the opposite.” Zizka says as he strides forward to meet him, his armour dented and streaked with blood. ”Where’s the youngster?” he asks at once.
Radzig stands a few paces back, still holding the sword, eyes fixed somewhere far beyond them all. His silence says more than words could.
It falls to Hanush to speak. His voice lowers as he turns to Zizka and the rest of the Devil’s Pack. He tells them of Henry’s passing. How Henry succeeded at sneaking through enemy lines, successfully carrying the message for Jobst’s, how he saved his brother’s life. How he died a hero for it.
Hans hears the words, but they pass through him. They’re already speaking of Henry as if he were gone from the world, a story now instead of a man. Somewhere nearby, he hears Katherine soft sobs.
Hanush turns to him. “I’m glad you’re still in one piece, Hans!”
Hans forces a breath, but no answer comes. He’s not. That arrow should have found his heart instead of his shoulder.
Around him, the others talk of courage and victory, but Hans ignores it.
Henry should be here with them, mud-smeared and grinning, celebrating the end of the siege. He should be laughing among them, not spoken of in the past tense like some fallen hero.
Hans stares at the ground, his hands trembling. He can’t imagine his life without his best friend in it. Without his voice, his laugh, his relentless hope.
The world feels distant, dulled.
Hanush calls to him and gestures toward the gate. Hans follows without a word. His body moves, but his mind drifts somewhere else, caught between disbelief and exhaustion.
They pass through the damaged castle walls, the stench of smoke still heavy in the air. The noise of the courtyard fades behind them.
His thoughts move sluggishly, muffled, as if he’s walking through a nightmare he can’t wake from.
Henry can’t be gone. He’s always fine. He always finds a way out, talking his way out of trouble and dragging them both home in one piece. He’s too stubborn to die.
Hanush speaks to him, his tone practical and unyielding. A marriage, he says. To a woman from a powerful house, wealthy and well connected. A match to secure alliances and strengthen both their houses. It’s what’s expected of him. What’s needed.
Hans barely hears him. The world is spinning.
He feels nothing. No anger, no protest. Just emptiness. What does it matter anymore whom he marries, or what becomes of him? His life feels like it belongs to someone else, some noble pawn moved across a board he never chose to play on.
Hanush studies him for a moment, then gives a short nod.
“I expected more of a fight from you,” he says, almost approving. “Glad you’re finally acting responsibly.”
He gives Hans a brief pat on the shoulder. “And get something to eat before you keel over.”
Then he turns and walks back toward the camp, his figure shrinking against the broken walls until he’s gone.
Hans stays where he is. The silence closes in around him.
Marriage. Duty. Responsibility. None of it matters. The one person who ever saw more in him than a spoiled lordling is gone, taken from him after a single night together, one fleeting moment when everything had finally felt right.
He closes his eyes, remembering the warmth of Henry’s voice, the touch of his hand, the way he had looked at him. It feels unreal now.
Somewhere beyond the walls, the world stirs back to life, soldiers cheering, the living returning to their tasks. But Hans stands apart from it all.
A breath shudders through him. He blinks once, then again, and a tear slips free, tracing down his cheek.
He doesn’t wipe it away.